What to do when you think a child is being damaged by MbP?

A member of my extended family is causing us some concern. She's got a four year old daughter who has mild learning difficulties, but it appears to everyone else in the family that she is trying to make the learning difficulties seem much greater than they are - she has a track record of exaggerating illnesses herself in order to garner sympathy (I've lost count of the terminal illnesses she has - unfortunately, stupidity doesn't count!), and a couple of year ago was stripped of all the disability allowances she was claiming when a doctor realised that her problems are a little more than bone idleness. She manipulates unwary people with the skill of a con-artist, winning them over with her sob stories and then fleecing them for money and favours (in one case, someone at her church agreed to rent her a new house, which she completely wrecked and never paid a penny in rent for).

It is by-the-by, but I am actually convinced that her daughter's learning difficulties are the result of shaken baby syndrome - at my insistence, social services investigated this three years ago and sadly couldn't find sufficient evidence. They did implement 24 hour surveillance for several weeks, but have been less directly involved in a supervisory capacity ever since.

I now think that she's trying to label the child as disabled to either garner more benefits from the government, or more sympathy from other people she can use. She puts the child in a wheelchair when she is perfectly capable of walking, fastens her nappies so tight that the child cannot pull them down to go to the toilet (so the child now doesn’t drink a lot so she doesn’t have to wee in her nappies), buys every tool possible that is intended to support children with special needs when she doesn’t actually need any of them, and generally goes out of her way to make sure that her child is labelled as ‘special’ so that she can be seen as the doting mother who has a hard life bringing up this ‘difficult child’.

She joins every society possible for concerned parents, and always writes posts in on-line fora in such a way that everyone will see her as a victim and reassure her that she is a wonderful parent. She isn't. She's just a very competent liar.

To my mind, this is just another form of child abuse – the child is starting to believe that she is disabled, even though when away from her mother, she can run, jump and play just like any other child. My wife (an early years teacher with a special needs background) believes that she is at the lower ability end for her age group, but certainly not to the point where she needs special equipment – she just needs time spending with her. She can’t use a knife and fork well, but that’s probably because she’s fed on a diet of McDonalds and KFC so has not had a lot of experience of cutlery! She can't hold a pen properly, but again, lots of kids start school without that ability - it doesn't mean they are disabled.

To give you another example, the reason we involved social services was because the child's behaviour and health changed abruptly - at a time when her mother was talking to my wife about how angry and frustrated she was with bringing up a baby (and she has a very firey, volatile temprament - her first marriage was very unhealthy, with both sides regularly beating the other up), overnight the child lost much of her vision and became very withdrawn and unresponsive - classic symptoms of shaken baby syndrome. This is what triggered an investigation, but there wasn't sufficient evidence to take it much further, just the circumstantial evidence of the child's condition.

However, the aftermath provided a real insight into her state of mind - she claimed her daughter was having lots of tests (which she wasn't - at least, not the ones she said her daughter was having) and that she was virtually blind (which she wasn't) and that it was an untreatable condition (which it isn't) - and insisted this was the case even after the child had had an operation to repair the damage. She spent months applying for grants and funding, and even secured a place in a school for blind children, until their assessment revealed that the child's eyesight could be largely corrected with spectacles. From an outside perspective, she was relishing the attention - she'd tell everyone she met about how hard it had been and how bleak the child's future was, but that they were willing to give up everything to give her the best possible start in life. And people believed her, as they always do, and she started to receive all kinds of stuff - clothes, money, accommodation - from people who were moved by her terrible plight.

It didn't wash with us, any more than the illness she had that would leave her in a wheelchair within 12 months did six years ago. Surprise, surprise - it didn't.

I don’t know what we can do to help the child out – social services are already involved, but the mother is expert at saying the right things, and making sure she’s surrounded by well-meaning (foolhardy) folk who sit with her in meetings telling the social workers just what a good mother she is being. And when people finally get the measure of her, they move somewhere else to start it all again.

I don’t know if there is an element of Munchausen’s syndrome here, or if is it pure manipulation, but the person who will lose the most is a child who is starting to accept the label her mother has created for her.

I can understand why social services are fooled by the mother – she’s not guilty (this time) of physically hurting the child, she’s just mentally damaging her and doing everything she can to make the child into a victim who needs help. Other kids laugh at the child for still wearing nappies – and the child sees this but can’t do anything other than stopping drinking – so she’s a victim. She puts her in a wheelchair as ‘she gets tired easily’ (but all kids claim they are tired on shopping trips – and just like other kids, she perks right up when she realises that she can play in the adventure play area at the end of the shopping trip!), and she insists on giving her a dinner plate that separates the different food items, as the mother’s convinced she’s autistic, but she doesn’t have a problem eating food when it is presented on a normal plate – in fact, it makes her feel grown up!

And yet, because she spends every waking hour looking for extra support (money) for her child, and using it to buy every implement necessary to make life easier for her child (most of which is completely unnecessary), she appears like a doting mother.

So the first question is, does this sound like MbP from this description, and the second question is how the heck can you help this child to be given a decent life, or is the writing on the wall, and she’ll be permanently damaged by the mother? I feel wicked saying it, but I couldn't give two hoots about how the mother reacts, it just riles me to the core that this child could be permanently damaged by this.

Sorry for such a long posting, especially as it is my first, but hopefully the detail will help.

Welcome to the forum and thank you for your detailed post. I am not a professional but this sounds like it could well be MBP to me. Whilst it is good that social services are involved, if they are getting sucked into her lies or she is moving once they have the measure of her then there is always the police. You could tell them you are concerned that there is a child at risk and whilst social services are involved, you dont believe the matter is being appropriately treated. Could you print off your post from here and show it to both social services and the police as it explains the situation well. And also ask social services to pass on details to their colleagues if she moves. This will hopefully mean her behaviour will catch up with her. But if the child is still in danger then do not be afraid of contacting the police. Good luck and let us know how you go.

Cracked

I'd not even considered the police, as there is no real physical evidence of the crime - the mother is signed up to SWAN UK (Syndromes Without a Name), which again plays into this idea that she's just a doting mother who knows that there is something majorly wrong with her child, and yet when she is not around,the child is, to all intents and purposes, a child with minor learning difficulties.

When we last called in Social Services, they didn't take it seriously until I contacted the NSPCC - but I think that the difference there is that I believed that there had been physical injury caused by an assault and was prepared to go on record as saying that.

How do the police react to complaints of, effectively, mental abuse?

Again I am not a professional but essentially what you are reporting is child abuse and I think they would want to launch an investigation because of that alone. However I cannot vouch for this. I dont think they would consider you are wasting their time tho they may say that social services are involved and they should deal with it - but even if they say that you can tell social services the police want them to be involved, which hopefully should have some weight to it. When you spoke to the NSPCC did you mention MBP specifically as if not that might be another route to go down.

Cracked

Spoken to the NSPCC. They suggest either contacting yourself saying you are concerned about MBP, contacting Childrens' Services in your local area or contacting the police. If you contact them they will do the referral for you.

Cracked

Thank you - I'll give that a go. The whole situation makes my blood boil.

I didn't mention MbP when I phoned them the first time - I was more concerned at the time about physical harm - and to be honest, we've been largely out of the loop with the child since then (needless to say, the mother wasn't too happy when she found out who had told social services about her!), it is only now, when things start to be going pear shaped again that the family is telling us what is going on.

I can understand that it makes you so angry. I hope the info I have come up with helps. By NSPCC doing a referral I assume they mean to child services. The guy I spoke to seemed to know what he was thinking about as he was a paeds nurse.

Good luck

Cracked

It sounds like MBP to me. My own mother did and said some of the exact same things you describe.

Have you tried taking video of the child playing, running, eating, etc? If the "sick child" is being presented to social services and they don't see how healthy & normal she really is, video evidence could convince them something is wrong with the mother.

video is a great idea hon, I am so sorry you went through this. Thinking of you

Cracked

mother is classic case of MSbP:

checks all sixteen points:

http://munchausenssyndromebyproxywithad ... asite.com/